Anyone who has interacted with me, knows how negative I’ve become in terms of this game, and the community. My last 4 posts, while not toxic necessarily, were also not necessarily productive. So I want to share my critique of the game as it stands. Why I think it needs a rework, and whats most important in said rework. But between those, I will address some of the wants of the community as well. And finally, what the game needs going forward.
Lets start with the Critique. Many of you will not agree with me. Most of the people who see as I do, have already left the game, because they have lost faith in the future of this game. I wont lie, I have too. But Ill keep fighting the good fight.
The game is an Asymmetrical game. However unlike most other asymmetrical games, you can (And rather easily at that), kill the predator. This changes the game vastly from other asymmetrical games alone. Despite the name “Hunting Grounds” very little hunting is involved. Most games devolve more into an arena shooter, and last anywhere from 5-10 minutes. Also unlike other asymmetrical games, the death of a player on the fireteam, can be negated one time by a reinforcement call. (basically a respawn). The balance in this game is extremely fragile. matches can swing in either sides favor, depending on meta abuse, and player skill level. All of the DLC thus far, have been either cosmetics, weapons, or classes. The classes are pay to win by nature (though they are not overpowered technically), The weapons are pay to win early access (These are often where imbalances lie, but by the time they are made available to the rest of the player base, they have been nerfed into uselessness). And the cosmetics are well… cosmetics. They do nothing to further the game, beyond adding more for players to collect. They also impact queue times depending on which side they are released for. The game also still has pretty Horrendous bugs, performance issues, and clunky designs, which heavily obstruct any enjoyment one may have of the game. However despite that, the game is really quite beautiful, and visually appealing.
For those of you who are reading this, you most likely already know this, and if you haven’t realized the specific issues of the game consciously, subconsciously you know they are there. The truth is, that this games overall design when it comes to gameplay, makes the balance of the game, extremely fragile. The most common posts, since day one, have been requests to buff this, nerf that. But it doesnt matter how many times they nerf or buff things, the balance will never truly exist, with the current vision of the game. And what balance the game does have, is easily exploitable in its current state, in the form of meta weapons, and abusing mechanics. they have created a glass sheet as the foundation for this game, and every step forward, is potentially a step back as it cracks, and potentially breaks the glass with which it stands upon.
Now to quickly address the most common things I see in terms of wants for the community. Ive already addressed why nerfing and buffing things isnt enough, however I would like to dissect other ideas out there. First one is maps. People ask for snow, city, desert, etc, Maps. First I would like to say, that new maps will not alone fix the game. Bigger maps will only make the current gameplay more tedious, as it will only lead to more drawn out and tedious matches. Both sides will spend more time running around, yet the combat will still be the same. The new scenery will be nice for a time, but it wont last. As for the different map ideas. The issue, is that maps such as snow/desert, will not have any kind of terrain for pred to gain the height advantage from (Predkour will be nonexistant), nor foliage for the fireteam to use to break line of site. so those two are instantly out. Moving on to cities. Cities MIGHT work. But they will be very difficult to design in the slightest competent way. Two issues are present with cities. Predkour will have to be completely redesigned to work on buildings, however even if it is, it will be worthless for pred, as most of the time FT will be covered by buildings. Large, destructible windows might be enough to make this work, however they will almost certainly cause hard performance hurdles. Unfinished buildings, and construction sites also could work, but I doubt it will work very well. The second issue, is that pred, being locked in a third person view, will have absolutely no ability to get inside and fight inside buildings and through doorways, without wanting to shoulder cannon his own head off. Most likely, all new maps will take place in jungles, however, another idea, is night maps. Night maps very well could work, having FT have night vision, and pred using his thermal, would be interesting. The glow of preds mask eyes, could be brighter through night vision, preventing him from being too hard to spot. Another idea behind the maps is locations, So fine, we are stuck to jungle maps, But what can we do? We need more unique locations. Temples, Coastal shipyards, Crashed alien ships (in a jungle on an alien world) etc. There is many things that can be done to keep things interesting. No matter what though, the devs really need to avoid putting out of bounds areas on tops of roofs (Im looking at you temple ruins).
I also did a poll and one of my questions was whether or not the game should be more stealth oriented, and the majority of those who voted agreed on a stealth focus.
And finally, the reason I think this is a rework, and not a gamemode requirement, is because to successfully get this new style of gameplay to work, many of the things in game will need to change. For them to keep the current mode, while also facilitating a new mode, they would have to have every single thing in game work differently for each mode, which would be confusing, and a bitch to maintain. Better to just uproot everything and get a fresh start.
So on to the rework. Ive got an entire rework guide that I posted here, which you can find at the bottom of this post. But To summarize what I think is most important, would be helpfull for those who dont feel like reading another novel.
First off, match length. To facilitate the rest of the changes I have in mind, the matches need either to be 30 minutes long exactly as a hard cap (20 min roughly to complete objectives, 10 min to deal with pred. Or they need to be uncapped, meaning they will last as long as it takes for either side to win, and the objectives need to take roughly 25 min to complete.
Secondly, obviously maps need to be larger. They also need to be more active. More AI patrols, More bases. ETC. Walking around shouldnt be boring for the FT, though they should have quite a bit of travel time.
Third, Predator needs to have better stealth, and tracking. Stealth needs to be more reliable, crouch walking and moving from branch to branch being quieter, and leaving pred fully invis. However shooting weapons, moving normally, sprinting, or leaping leaving him semi visible (bow is an exception). Tracking should be more active, remove pigs, and remove target isolation. FT members should leave footprints that appear 50 meters or so after they have been somewhere. Leaving a trail for pred to follow, but that doesnt lead directly to the poor ft member mudded and hiding in a bush. Pred medkits should automatically be a part of his kit, and should have cooldowns (think how lesion traps “recharge” in siege roughly)
Fourth, a single FT member should be able to second wind predator alone. basically, preds normal health should be very weak. However second wind should be more frequently available, perhaps once every 3-5 minutes, and while in second wind, preds health should be more resistant, sort of like now. That way the match cant be ended too easily.
Fifth, objectives should either split FT members up, or pred should have more unique ways to split up FT members. Reinforcements should also be removed, with the fireteams newfound power.
Overall this should shift preds gameplay from rushing, to track, stalk, divide and conquer. Whilst shifting FT from Fireteam Hunting grounds, to a true test of survival. This will also significantly reduce queue times, as FT members leaving on death, means you no longer need 4 FT for every one Pred at a single time. People will be constantly cycling in and out of matches, and as such queue times will be wayy better. even when more people play pred. Not to mention FT will be far more of a challenge, and actually be fun and worth playing.
Once this kind of foundation is laid out, Weapon and gear balancing will not only be much more trivial to manage, but the stronger foundation will allow more creativity, in the content, and perhaps even the introduction to classes having true abilities, rather than ONLY different stats. I think personally that this is what the game needs to find itself again, to bring back older fans, and to keep newer ones. And I think this is also why new maps, and fan favorite skins, etc will not alone fix the game, only prolong the playerbases interest in it temporarily.
My other works can be found here.
